First and foremost, my apologies for not posting this earlier, but I thought the entire site was down until the new site goes live. However, it would appear that the blog is working, so I can still keep the loyal GameCola fanbase (i.e. our moms) entertained until then. Huzzah!

Anyway, I'm sure most of you out there are familiar with, or have at least heard of, Lewis Black. For those of you who aren't he's a very talented comedian known for his angry and insightful rants, sort of like what I try to do here except, you know, funny. Well, he has a particular one about candy corn that I find applies to many of the games I play. To paraphrase, Mr. Black despises candy corn because, despite the fact that the name implies tastiness, candy corn is a vile tasting confection foisted upon the world  every Halloween. Due to the fact that it is only present once a year, people forget that candy corn tastes like tainted earwax and, upon seeing it displayed, will start eating, only to be reminded once again that candy corn is a hideous affront to all that is sugary and good. This annual cycle continues indefinitely, as we are all far too forgetful and trusting when it comes to things labeled "candy."

Well, the same thing happens with me and certain games where I will: (1) start playing, (2) get bored/frustrated, (3) turn the game off, swearing to never touch it again. A few hours later, however I seem to have forgetten all about the bad parts and I turn the game on again, only to be quickly reminded why I turned it off in the first place. This cycle repeats until I either beat the game, force myself to get rid of it, or have Vangie take it away from me. The most recent example of this was Tales of the Abyss, for the PS2. I had enjoyed Tales of Symphonia on the Gamecube, so I thought I would try this out. YE GODS is this game annoying. The characters are a bunch of completely unrelatable and infuriatingly annoying aristocrats with voices that left me doing all I could to cover my ears and skip any movie scenes. Magic and religion in the game is based on sound, called "Fonistry" or "Fonics," and nearly every other word that comes out of the characters' mouths is "fon-this" or "fon-that." Seriously, just watch an episode of The Smurfs and replace the word "smurf" with "fon" and you'd be pretty close to what's going on here. Lastly, the most egregious sin this game commits is having a railroad plot that will shuffle you along the game's plot points regardless of whether you're ready. And if you try to go back and get some stuff done, too bad! Odds are the quest could only be done at the specific time, and now you're screwed.

Despite the psychological wounds inflicted by these design flaws, I would end up playing it a few times a day, each time forgetting that Tales of the Abyss was about as enjoyable as having teeth pulled. I'm not sure exactly how I forget that between each play session, but somehow every few hours I would gleefully turn on the game, expecting nothing but good times and fun. Just like candy corn, though, the only thing that awaited me was frustration and disappointment.

No, this isn\'t a post about my anger about my eventual sentence to the lower reaches of Hell for all of my earthly transgressions (I\'ve already accepted that as an unavoidable fact), this a rant about the new game Damnation by Blue Omega studios. I was interested in this game for a while, ever since I actually applied to Blue Omega for a job (they\'re based in Central Maryland). They never called, so I decided that Damnation would be a test as to whether I should have been about this fact.

YE GODS, THIS GAME IS TERRIBLE.

Seriously, I feel like I dodged a bullet with this one. In Damnation, Blue Omega takes a potentially interesting setting, a post-apocalyptic steam-punk Civil War America, and introduces terrible third person combat and platforming mechanics. The controls and difficulty are so incredibly unbalanced and poorly designed that I wasn\'t even able to get past the first freaking level. If a game wants to be successful, it has to abide by three very simple concepts:
1. Easy to learn
2. Difficult to master
3. Addictive
Damnation succeeds in none of these things, and you would think one of the QA testers would have pointed out some of the flaws, especially those that are evident AS SOON  AS THE PLAYER BEGINS THE GAME. Seriously, do not buy/rent/play this game, it\'s not worth it.  And Blue Omega? I\'ve got a riddle for you. Who has two thumbs and is very glad he doesn\'t work for you?

This guy.

As some you know, this past weekend I went up to Philadelphia to participate in the 2009 Pokemon Video Game Championships. Essentially it's a big tournament where Pokemon trainers face off against each other in two divisions, junior and senior, with the winners going to the Nationals in St. Louis. It was supposed to be a really fun event, but a new development in this year's rules made the whole thing pretty disappointing. This year, instead of letting everyone participate, they had entrants sign up and then randomly chose 128 people to participate in each division. This wouldn't have been so bad if around 256 people had attended, but as it happened NEARLY 600 PEOPLE SHOWED UP FOR THE SENIORS DIVISION ALONE.

Needless to say at this point, I didn't get in, but that's not what has me angry. What really ticks me off about this is the fact that people came from as far away as MILWAUKEE and didn't get in. All in all, this was just a really poor way to handle an event like this. They could have AT LEAST set up some sort of online registration where participants were chosen ahead of time so people wouldn't have had to waste time and money on travel. And don't tell me Nintendo can't afford the expenses associated with a bigger event or planning ahead: they're making money hand over fist right now. Nintendo, if you want to do a Pokemon tournament do it right, otherwise contract it out to someone else who will. This is no way to treat the fans of one of your most popular franchises.

This will be a short one because you're either with me or against me on this and I doubt any amount of arguing will help. Yesterday in GameFAQ's "Best. Game. Ever." contest (GameFAQ's contests really are fertile ground for my anger) Final Fantasy VII beat Chrono Trigger. No. Just no. Final Fantasy VII, while an interesting game, is no where near the level of Chono Trigger. Hell, Chrono Trigger is best game Squaresoft ever produced. I don't know whether these people have never played CT or are just idiots, but something is fundamentally WRONG here.

Now if you'll excuse me, I think my brain just vomited. I should probably go to a hospital.

Anyone who's listened to the GC Podcast or talked to me for even a few minutes since last October knows my opinion on Fallout 3: an excellent but fundamentally flawed game. One of my biggest problems with the game is the ending, but apparently in the new DLC expansion Broken Steel the finale has been completely changed. I won't spoil the plot for anyone with specifics, but essentially they made all the plot changes I was griping for and allow you to continue after finishing the main story quest.

Honestly, I'm not sure how to feel about this. On one hand, I'm glad to hear that BethSoft has finally fixed what was one of the biggest problems with the game and I feel validated in my assertions about the game's ending. On the other hand, I feel ripped off that, if I want to actually play the game AS IT SHOULD HAVE ORIGINALLY BEEN RELEASED, I need to pay extra. It's quite a racket BethSoft has going on here: releasing incomplete products then charging you outrageous sums of money for the fixes and marginal expansions to the game. I remember a time when an expansion to a game was a whole game within itself, not just little bit of tweaking here and there. Call me a luddite, but I remember those day quite fondly.

I haven't purchased any of the expansions yet, nor do I plan to do so until they package them together with a price cut. There was a time when tempation would have driven me to get download them as soon as they came out, but between my stubborness and GameFly (mainly GameFly) I think I should be able to hold out. Not to mention that, at least until June 6, I have bigger fish to fry.

Hey everyone, I'm going to try out a new little blog series I've entitled "The Anger Dome." Essentially, it's me ranting about a topic that has proved particularly provoking to my ire. Today's topic: Portal vs. MGS4 in the GameFAQS "Best. Game. Ever." contest.

If you're not familiar with the contest, it's essentially a huge popularity contest where visitors to the site vote for which of the four games featured that day are the best. The top two move on to the next bracket, and then 4 new games are featured. Yesterday the contest was between BioShock, Little Big Planet, Metal Gear Solid 4, and Portal. When I visited the site yesterday I said to myself "Ah, well surely Portal will win, it's as near a perfect game as I've ever seen." So consider my surprise when, after voting, I see that MGS4 has a huge lead over it. Portal still advanced to the next round, but only barely, with MGS4 winning nearly 50% percent of the vote.

This is bullshit. Complete and utter bullshit. I played MGS4, and I sealed it up and sent it back to GameFly after half an hour. The game is simply not fun. First off, Snake is OLD. Someone might want to tell Kojima this, but somehow trying to sneak around as an old person with obvious health problems kind of kills the whole coolness factor. I kept feeling like I was going to break his fucking hip. Secondly, they tried to do too much with the combat and sneaking systems, so much so that both felt clunky and underdeveloped. Focus on one or the other and make them really good, but don't make me choose between two crappy alternatives when I want to play. Finally, after sending it back, I checked the plot summary on Wikipedia just to stifle any curiousity I had. Ugh, Jesus Tap-Dancing Christ. The story has plot twists that would make even M. Night Shaymalamadingdong cringe. Seriously, when did the developers decide to just stop making any sense? I'm guessing it was around the time of MGS2, when they made the GENIUS decision to make you play as Raiden for 2/3 of the game.

On the other hand we have Portal, sweet magnificent Portal. The game featured a brilliant new mechanic, great music, a great story, and superb voice-work. Also, it never felt tiring; as soon as the portal mechanic felt like it was starting to get old the game was over. The timing worked out perfectly, yet there are some people out there who claim the game was too short. HEY DUMBASSES, if you're playing videogames to waste time, by all means go play something like MGS4. If, however, you'd like a game that is an actual enjoyable experience, maybe you should take your heads out of your asses and try Portal again. It was the first game in a long time that just made me smile while playing and afterwards left me feeling like I had broadened my horizons. I see Portal as one of the few games that can qualify as a work of art, not just a video game. Yet somehow, SOMEHOW, people compared the two and found MGS4 to be better. Are you kidding me? Are these people completely brain dead? It's like saying you prefer the new Star Wars trilogy to Battlestar Galactica just because of love for the original Trilogy. Well guess what, the new trilogy is shit and Battlestar Galactica has set the standard for modern sci-fi; the same is true for MGS4, Portal, and modern action/adventure games.

Before yesterday I thought Portal might go all the way in the GameFAQs challenge, but now with my faith in humanity completely shattered I seriously doubt that will happen. Judging from the predictions page it will most likely be MGS4, Final Fantasy VII, or Ocarina of Time. Hopefully the winner be the latter. If not, I may have to hurt someone.